[yterdy]

Whatever you'd like, you have to look at reality. It's clear that AI is coming for jobs that are about manipulating information before jobs that are about switching between manipulating objects and serving people.

Service jobs COULD be fulfilling. Spending a few hours a day helping your neighbors access the goods and services that they need is a part of community-building; people enjoy that kind of labor. The problem is the corporatization and "shareholder value"-centric bone-deep resource cuts that characterize most of these workplaces, where employees are forced to work under conditions that nominally prioritize profit over everything else (but are really also about, specifically: employee control, legal ass-covering, and union-busting).

If people got paid well for working limited and predictable hours where they could rely on coworkers to keep the labor load reasonable, I think these jobs would be more desirable. What better way to spend the value unlocked by AI automation?

[bumby]

A couple things:

1) as already stated elsewhere in this thread, automation has been coming for manual labor jobs for decades/centuries before AI has been coming for knowledge workers

2) I think "service" jobs is the wrong discriminator. There are lots of service jobs that are fulfilling. We're a social species and generally have the desire to contribute to our tribe. Service jobs often scratch that itch. Personal training, wedding planners, hairstylists, chef etc. are all service jobs that are fulfilling enough that people want to do those things even when they don't get paid. That should be confused with the rote, drudgery that is associated with jobs like assembly line work or fast food. I'd argue it's less about the pay (although that can't be ignored) and more about the work. Just look at the service job of attorney with its relatively high bar of entry and high pay, yet it still has pretty insane attrition rates. Even if the pay and status is good, people want a job that's fulfilling.

[yterdy]

1) *Silicon-based manual automation (which is mere decades old and has hit a people-shaped wall)

2) You're conflating and categorizing jobs to benefit your argument, not as an accurate reflection of what I presented. Chef work is brutal, too. The main point seems to be that a mechanically unfulfilling job either needs to have fulfilling social contact (functioning as pressure relief, leverage, etc.), or high pay (i.e., an out). Most people would work a (safe) soul-deadening job for a year if they'd get 20 times the median wage out of it.

[bumby]

I think that “people shaped wall” is largely defined by that subsidization problem already mentioned elsewhere. If people were paid a non-subsidized wage I think that “silicon-based” automation would begin to take even more of a substantial amount of manual labor. But that “silicon-based” piece is a constraint that wasn’t part of my original point, so it seems you’re levying that for your own, different argument.

I’m only using the words you mentioned. You brought up service jobs, although you may have been using the term somewhat sloppily. Your explanation seems to bolster the point though. People will “put up with” a soulless job if it’s a means to an end. People don’t simply “put up” with a job that is inherently fulfilling. Circling back to the original point, AI forcing people into drudgery is probably not to the benefit of society, especially if there isn’t high pay.

[yterdy]

> If people were paid a non-subsidized wage I think that “silicon-based” automation would begin to take even more of a substantial amount of manual labor.

This is the opposite of most takes, which hold that automation takes over when wages climb too high. But this again assumes capability that machines haven't demonstrated, and does not consider the social externalities.

>But that “silicon-based” piece is a constraint that wasn’t part of my original point

We're talking about AI.

I think you're letting your personal fears warp your analysis. It's clear that service jobs - I am using the correct denotation - are not ipso facto drudgery if structured in such a way as to minimize antisocial aspects. Namely, long hours, weird schedules, and understaffing, which exacerbate undesirable tasks. Happily, the value AI creates paired with the increased size of the service workforce ameliorates these concerns. Scanning groceries for 8 hours on minimum wage sucks. Scanning groceries for 4 hours for higher pay, and with backup in case you need a break, or to leave early, or have an irrate customer, sucks a lot less. This is the clear goal we should be aiming for in order to crowd out the actual dystopias in the works.

[bumby]

>hold that automation takes over when wages climb too high.

It's not when wages climb too high, it's when the cost differential between wages and automation climb too high. It's possible to have stagnant or declining wages and still be taken over by automation, if the cost of automation drops at a faster rate.

>We're talking about AI.

Yes, and the OP was talking about what happens when AI takes peoples jobs. I was making the larger contextual point that we can see what happens when people lose their job to technology. AI job loss is a subset of that broader context.

>It's clear that service jobs - I am using the correct denotation - are not ipso facto drudgery if structured

I think you've moved the goalposts to suit your arguement. The original point was that people will be working "retail/food" jobs.

>Every retail/food service job is understaffed. You ask what people displaced by AI will do for a living? That.

You took that original point and then expanded it to encompass all service jobs. I do not think all service jobs are drudgery, and I'm made that point clear. Will AI help us get to the point where all get semi-leisurely pro-social and fulfilling work in a service economy? Maybe to a techno-optimist, but I don't see evidence that is the direction our system tends toward. Even if it did, I think it will be a long, long time away with the potential for miserable local minima along the way. So while I do think that certain service jobs can be fulfilling, that is not the future the OP was initially claiming we'd inhabit.

[yterdy]

>It's not when wages climb too high, it's when the cost differential between wages and automation climb too high. It's possible to have stagnant or declining wages and still be taken over by automation, if the cost of automation drops at a faster rate

You're splitting hairs to distract from the fact that you misrepresented the dynamic earlier. The point remains that the purported bare per-unit-hour cost savings of AI-based automation versus human labor doesn't necessarily account for newly-incurred costs and externalities, which is the real reason why the latter hasn't been replaced.

>I was making the larger contextual point that we can see what happens when people lose their job to technology. AI job loss is a subset of that broader context.

You broadened the scope to non-AI-based automation.

>The original point was that people will be working "retail/food" jobs.

Which is what I originally commented on. You keep asserting a fundamental drudgery inherent in those positions, and I'm saying that that's inaccurate. I'm not moving goalposts, I'm making a point about why more people working them, and having an interest in working conditions and pay being better, will lessen that drudgery.

>You took that original point and then expanded it to encompass all service jobs.

No.

>I do not think all service jobs are drudgery, and I'm made that point clear.

I don't think you have.

>Will AI help us get to the point where all get semi-leisurely pro-social and fulfilling work in a service economy? Maybe to a techno-optimist, but I don't see evidence that is the direction our system tends toward.

So, here is the crux of the issue. My argument was simple, but it's apparently so outside your concept of what's possible that you just... refuse to understand it. That's fine, people get dragged kicking and screaming into the future all the time. But that doesn't make me wrong. It just means you lack some combination of imagination and observation skills. And I'm sorry if that's rude, but I've had arguments with Trump supporters and nuclear energy advocates that were less frustrating.

>So while I do think that certain service jobs can be fulfilling, that is not the future the OP was initially claiming we'd inhabit.

To conclude, hopefully for good: I know. I'm (first mention of AI) OP. I explained the remedies for the current woes of such positions as workers are inevitably displaced to them.